"Scary stuff" UPDATE: the hack was TurboTax (NEWER UPDATE)

[TurboTaxChristine]

51. TurboTax has not been hacked

Hi Folks,
Christine from TurboTax here. I want to assure you that TurboTax has not been hacked. We continuously monitor our systems in search of suspicious activity. And through that process, we have found no evidence of a data breach. In addition, we asked a third-party security firm – FireEye/Mandiant – to do an independent assessment. All evidence indicates that those initiating these attacks obtained information outside the tax filing process.

During this tax season, we have seen a significant increase in attempts by criminals to use stolen identity information such as names and social security numbers obtained from other sources outside the tax preparation process to file fraudulent state tax returns. This illegal activity originates outside the tax preparation process and uses TurboTax as the vehicle to commit this crime.

We will have more information coming on this issue, but I wanted to assure you that our customer's data is safe.

If you've been a victim of identity theft, we've established a dedicated 800 number where customers impacted by tax fraud can obtain further information with serially trained identity protection agents.

-Christine Morrison
TurboTax Communications